


Tremble Little Lion Man

by aisydays



Category: The Penumbra Podcast
Genre: Also Angelo is a Good Friend, Hugs, I basically do a hit on Damien, In that the comfort is mild, Mild Hurt/Comfort, Multi, Panic, Spoilers, The Fear Monster, but like... emotionally, post-The Battle of World's End Part One, this fic is a MESS
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-02-14
Updated: 2019-02-14
Packaged: 2019-10-28 12:19:49
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,472
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17787290
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/aisydays/pseuds/aisydays
Summary: ~~ Spoilers for The Battle of World's End Part One ~~There's something in the halls of Fort Terminus. Something more deadly than any knight, and more manipulative than any monster. Rilla is going to need to keep her wits about her if she wants to destroy it. But a sudden discovery in the hallways means that might be easier said than done.





	Tremble Little Lion Man

**Author's Note:**

> This fic was wrote in a frenzy so that I could get it out before the new episode, which will almost certainly render this completely redundant :') 
> 
> Title and lyrics from Little Lion Man by Mumford and Sons, aka the ultimate Damien anthem

__And it was not your fault but mine  
And it was your heart on the line  
I really fucked it up this time  
Didn't I my dear?

 

They found him in the halls of the Fort. 

The group had split up, widening the search for the Fear Monster - Tal insisted on the name and honestly, Rilla wasn’t in any mood to argue. Her mind seemed like it was split in pieces, each part screaming its own concerns, trying to drown out the others. Arum’s injuries, the threat to the Citadel, her complete and utter distrust of Caroline, trying to keep Talfryn safe, Damien… the last one was almost painful to think about. Seeing him in that cell, the look in his eyes as he held Arum against him, knife to the lizard’s throat. The cold, cruel glint, as the last grip he had on reality slipped from his fingers like sand.

She couldn’t dwell on things like that right now. Rilla had a job to do, lives were at stake, and this was no time for personal problems. For the moment, all that mattered was finding the monster, traipsing through the corridors with Angelo by her side and Talfryn bringing up the rear. Caroline had protested against the groupings, but Rilla had dug her heels in. She wasn’t going anywhere without Tal, and he in turn was surprisingly insistent on keeping Angelo with them. Although she was hesitant to admit it, there was something comforting having the knight with them, and not just because of his frankly ridiculous stature. Rilla had never understood what drew Damien to his greatest rival, why he insisted on keeping up his ridiculous competition despite all the injuries and the sleepless nights, but she was starting see how having the gentle giant around was a strange type of security.

And Saints did she need some security right then. 

When you were going up against a monster that fed on fear, literally preying on your terror, any source of comfort was as good as a full suit of armour. Rilla knew that, remembered how she felt staring at the fake Damien sinking into the swamp, her worst fear played out before her eyes. If Arum was right, if that was just the work of this thing’s larvae, then she didn’t want to think about what the grown adult could do. 

Rilla was so wrapped up in thought, she almost walked straight into Angelo. The large man had stopped dead in his tracks, completely still. It was almost unnerving, coming from Angelo who never stopped moving, not really, even if it was just a foot tapping or fidgeting hand. Seeing him so completely motionless like this… it was wrong. 

She couldn’t see what had caused her companion to stop like this, and the nervous muttering coming from behind her gave the impression Talfryn didn’t either, but she could hear a faint sound coming through the darkness ahead of them. It sounded like ragged breathing, interspersed with what sounded almost like sobs.

It was only when Rilla stepped out from behind Angelo that she noticed where they were coming from.

“Sir… Damien?” Angelo said, his usually booming voice hushed. The figure curled in a ball on the floor looked up in alarm, eyes unfocused and staring. He glanced around, looking more like a feral beast than a man, until his eyes fell on Rilla.

“...Rilla.”

Damien’s voice was hoarse, so much more so than the last time they talked that it completely threw Rilla off for a second. It sounded like he’d been doing nothing but screaming for the hour or so they’d been apart. If he’d looked like a wreck before, then the man who lay huddled before him now was nothing more than a frightened shell. 

“Damien,” she replied, voice soft and soothing, reaching out a hand to her fiancé. The whole body flinch he gave hurt more than anything else that had happened that day. Even earlier, when he was ranting about tranquillity and manipulation, he hadn’t been so scared. It had been almost like a frenzied madness that had become crystallised, someone pushed to the brink in so many ways. This was more like what came beyond the brink, the swirling chaos at the edge of the world. 

“No… not again” Damien whimpered, curling in on himself in attempt to get away from them. Rilla drew back, towards the group, putting space between her and Damien. 

He continued to babble, almost unintelligible - Rilla could just about make out her name, and… Arum’s, along with what sounded like pleas for something, or someone, to  _ stop please stop I’m begging _ …

“Sir Damien, what’s wrong?” Angelo asked, still in that same hushed voice. For a second, Rilla almost wanted to scream at him that if Damien was going to flinch away from her like a kicked dog, to look up with those awful scared eyes, then what use would Angelo be? But as the knight approached, Damien didn’t shy away like he had before. Instead, he blinked up at Angelo, confused and dazed. 

When he spoke again, his voice was still that same strained rasp, wavering like he was on the edge of a panic attack. “Angelo… why are you here? Why am I seeing you… it’s been them before, it’s always been them, I’ve been seeing that moment played out before me time and time again but it’s been so  _ real _ , it’s not in my mind but it can’t be real, not again, I left, I ran, I…” As his voice trailed off, he tipped forward into Angelo’s embrace, shaking like a leaf. Angelo’s arms wrapped round him with practised ease, pulling him in the way he had done so many times before. Damien’s shaking continued but he melted into his friend, clutching him like a life-line.

Something that felt awfully like ugly jealousy struck Rilla in that moment, but she ignored it. Feeling envious of Angelo and Damien was not what she needed to be concentrating on right now, she’d already established that. And besides, something Damien said had stuck in her mind.

“Talfryn…” Rilla asked, turning to her brother. She could hear her voice cracking slightly as she spoke, but she carried on. This was important. “Did you hear what Damien said? About… about seeing things.” It was clear from the look on his face that speaking wasn’t really an option for Tal in that moment, but he nodded warily. “Did Marc ever tell you about what happened with us? And the numbcap? It was just before I was…”

Fortunately Talfryn cut her off with shake of his head before Rilla had to say anything more. Unfortunately this meant she now had to carefully explain what had happened in the swamp without mentioning Marc’s vision of his brother threatening to leave him behind, which definitely wasn’t something she wanted to bring up right now.

“Marc came to visit me, the morning I was kidnapped. We went into the forest to find some numb-cap for his medicine and… this monster’s larvae were growing on it. They used the mushroom’s spores to create these… visions, of what we feared the most.” Rilla took a deep breath, glancing over to where Damien was still clinging to his rival, face pressed into his chest as Angelo rubbed comforting circles into his back. 

“I think the same thing has happened to Damien.”

Angelo frowned “But what does he have to be afraid of? Who is this “they” he keeps mentioning?” At that, Damien gave a whimper and burrowed further into Angelo’s chest.

Guilt coursed through Rilla like fire in her veins, but she couldn’t say anything, not without incriminating Arum even further. She knew she couldn’t mention Damien’s breakdown, or her frantic confession as he went to strike the killing blow, or even the look on her fiancé's face when he heard her say she loved the lizard who’d stolen her away. He’d fled the room, and it had taken what little strength Arum had left to hold her back from going after him, into the dark corridors that had consumed her knight and spat him back out. 

“...I don’t know, Angelo” she lied, almost flinching at the distraught clear on the man’s face. It might have just been the paranoia talking, or whatever force this creature was transmitting that had already claimed Damien, but it seemed like there was something like doubt on Talfryn’s face.

Angelo rose to his feet, sweeping Damien up in his arms as if he weighed nothing, cradled close to Angelo’s chest with a tenderness Rilla hadn’t realised the big man was capable of. His face, however, was completely stony, barely concealed fury simmering underneath. He didn’t say anything, but he didn’t need to. 

They needed to find this monster. And they needed to destroy it.

**Author's Note:**

> If you want something a bit happier, throughout the month of February I'm posting my AU fic A For Effort, featuring Damien and Arum working at a secondary school. It has pining, cuddles, and an unreasonable amount of Lord of the Rings references 
> 
> If you're an absolute sadist who wants even more angst, I'm doing the Bad Things Happen Bingo! If you want to send me props, Second Citadel or otherwise, send me an ask on my tumblr, shutupeiffel. I'll be posting completed prompts on Ao3!


End file.
